Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Feds may delist wolves in 2011

U.S. Interior Department officials have pledged to members of Congress that the eastern timber wolf will be removed from the endangered species list sometime in 2011, though the move would still face legal scrutiny.

By: John Myers, Duluth News Tribune

U.S. Interior Department officials have pledged to members of Congress that the eastern timber wolf will be removed from the endangered species list sometime in 2011, though the move would still face legal scrutiny.

The pledge went to U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar on Thursday after she and other members of Minnesota’s congressional delegation had been pressuring the Interior Department to take action.

It’s the latest update in a decades-long saga over how wolves should be managed in the western Great Lakes.

In a letter to Klobuchar dated Dec. 9, Thomas Strickland, assistant Interior secretary for fish, wildlife and parks, pledged a proposal would be made public in April and that a new rule on wolf management could be final by the end of 2011.

“We now have a timetable that we didn’t have before,” said Georgia Parham, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service spokeswoman.

But agency officials cautioned that the proposal first must pass scientific review, be biologically credible and be subject to public comment. The end result would return management of wolves to state and tribal wildlife agencies and is the next step needed for states to allow trapping and hunting of wolves as they see fit.

There are about 3,200 wolves in Minnesota and about 700 each in Wisconsin and Michigan’s Upper Peninsula — many more than federal officials expected when the animal first received federal protection in 1974.